European shores have plenty of friendly SSKs. A we do not need any around "here". where would be deploy them (and would it even be practical without a fixed base)?

a newly developed hydropneumatic "kneeling" suspension and housed the entire crew in the large turret :D Not at all; at the time the Swedish "S" had already displayed the potential of such suspension, and Armata seems to have taken up the other main new feature... then they also...

Would be good to joint the Germans and French for a Eurotank 2030, and life extend challenger out to there. So we can do this "The MBT-70 (German: KPz 70) was a 1960s German-U.S. joint project to develop a new main battle tank, which was to be equipped with a number of advanced features. It ut...

I am with Tinman on this, actually I already said the same on the SDSR thread.

Personal speculation: Leo A7 will be the last of its line, and the merger with the French tips the balance towards lighter (around 40t) tanks. We through a few pennies in, to get an observer's seat on the programme, and will buy it eventually (rather then the M1A3). The Italians will get into the pa...

Tinman wrote:P8a is a MMA.

Will be, maybe, an 2022

P8a and Triton is what we will end up with, either that or a Bae, version of triton. Maybe, but the MoD have made it quite clear that they are looking for an MMA... why? Because specialised types are not only expensive, they also (by virtue of being single mission) crowd out the other parts of the ...

Can we have a thread for the renewal of UK's ISTAR fleet? Then all this digging into the trenches -type of BS (not talking about any individual) could stay here, and some sensible/ relevant discussion could ensue. I left this thread alone for the first 60 pages of it, and now regret that I ever post...

You are talking about factory floor management; I am talking about defence economics, and aligning kit (schedule as in IOC included), manpower, readiness... and if all of this (with, or somewhere around the given budget) does not fit together, then you review your force structure (surprise! you migh...

I did not want to say ron5 had a point there... SB: that is an intra-"factory" view, and does not consider the whole supply chain. One of the most basic things is to do an ABC costing... e.g the US Navy ordered the key components for their refit of half of the cruiser fleet upfront, to cou...

some degree of concurrency in the build, the optimum for cost savings being somewhere 2-around 27-33% so that you can move the different trades through the hulls in co-ordinated "waves" and not having anyone fiddling their thumbs... or the constatnt firing and then hiring, thus losing a l...

I am wondering since the older Seawolf 910 radar weighed 10 tons each and the newer 911 is 5 tons. The Phalanx weighs about 6 tons and if fitted would be lower down than the radar sets. New sets have to be ordered for the T26 as there aren't enough available now. Seems to be the on thing the T23 is...

Springer was a total failure, and has been flogged off as surplus (serving as golf buggies now?). But after the piece on the vehicle (Whippet, payload is the differentiator, but not mentioned what it is) there are more interesting snippets, e.g. I did not know that Starstreak incorporates IFF (inter...

You seem to be the second testy person I have come across here; I have already said what I will do in the future (about using the quote facility). - now I can add to that there will be no further interchange of "ideas" between us (things can change if I detect a better attitude) - Thanks f...

Would 3 x 9 plus 6 be a good number for a platoon, with a Javelin team added?

Well said; and those boats in their design were as close to an SSN that a conventionally powered sub can get - Collins class, stretched from another design, is another, even sadder story as it did not involve disruptions in maintenance but simply just the brief was overambitious relative to what the...

Probably just this IFV version: Bigger turret ring = less space for dismounts. An APC built on the same hull with an RWS in place of the turret (which is what the UK will be buying) probably has about the same amount of room for dismounts as the French one with a single-person turret, or maybe even...

Sorry old chap but you are crediting me with something I didn't post. That quote was part of Lugzy's article, my contribution was below it. I thought that quoting from within nested comments might be tricky, but rather than do a forensic examination, apologised ahead (of what I thought might be hap...

Interesting interview with Vago Muradian at DSEI 2015 :- http://www.defensenews.com/videos/defense-news/2015/09/18/72406708/ A good interview, but (while acknowledging that interview have to be kept short) there was the kit/ manpower dilemma portrayed as a dichotomy. In fact the job f the SDSR is t...

I remember one option BAE was looking at was to build two type 26s at a time in a frigate factory , probably they had export orders in mind ? But that idea was dropped , could that of been because of the lack of outside export interest ? Or something to do with Osborne wanting a slower drawn out bu...

I would be amazed, despite the high degree of recycling of the expensive bits.
- after all, they have grown into 7.000 t cruisers

Because they're merging with nexter who build the vbci and are prioritising that. Damn I need to decide on a new favourite now ! - sensible as such as the Boxer production line is more active. I think the French wheeled armour prgrm (Scorpion?) is stretched out over a v long period, for budgetary r...

13 T26 + 3 existing Rivers+ 3 new Rivers (and no Clyde, as it has had its fair share of shake-rattle& roll)=19?
- not exactly frigates, but thereabouts (ocean-going)

That's the famous AH version: 4 added, 4 diverted from the original order (62-58 = 4)

Well, the USN has put them all under one (purchasing) command: air, sub & surface unmanned... makes sense. Yes neural networks , and intelligent agents embedded in more structured software code, can be very useful and lighweight (compact part of the code, because they have a v specialist functio...